*RING-RING. RING-RING. RI-THUNK*
A black leather boot came crashing down onto the desk and the phone was bounced off it's receiver, launching into the air. It gained enough hang-time for a hand to snatch it from it's rapid spinning and bring it into position beside the owners head.
"Yes?" The owner questioned, waiting for the caller to answer. However, not a single word came back and all he could hear was the light static crackling into his ear. He was about to hang up when a voice with a terrible and obviously fake middle-eastern accent started talking.
"Hello, my name is Hamad Al-Asad, and I am here to inform you about-" He ended the call abruptly with the flick of a switch and sighed with frustration He threw the phone back to the receiver and it landed perfectly on it's mountings with a *ting*, and causing it to rattle a little bit. Dante continued to lean back in his chair with his legs up on the desk and his head resting in his hands.
"Another fake caller?" A provocatively dressed young women walked slowly in from the back room, swaying her hips a little with her foot falls. The heeled boots she wore made a heavy clapping sound as they impacted the floor, getting his attention and making him turn his head slightly.
"Eeyup." He said tiredly. "I'm getting so bored. Why can't another ass-hat, like, open a portal to the demon world or something?" He threw his arms out behind him for a second to emphasise his point.
"I don't know. Maybe we've already killed all the ass-hats who keep opening up portals to the demon world, or something." She suggested.
"So you're suggesting that we've run out of demon worshipers? Nah, there are way to many idiots out there for that to happen. Who was that weird guy with the book who helped my brother, again?"
"You mean the girl's father that you and Virgil killed yourselves?" She dead-panned him deeply.
"Yeah, that guy. I could bet my shitty wages there are still hundreds of people like him wandering about, looking for ways to try and obtain my fathers power."
"Well, until they try something then we've just gotta wait for them to show themselves. And besides, that kid Nero has Yamato now, so not only do they have us to worry about. I'm sure Nero would be more than happy to put down a few more demons to protect his girlfriend, at least." Dante nodded slowly in understanding.
"And our 'shitty wages' aren't actually that low. It's just that you waste them by practically living on pizza, Strawberry Sundae's and beer, so the amount of money you spend on junk-food just makes our wages feel shitty." She turned a little sour all of a sudden and glared at him.
"Bite me." Dante put on a 'not giving a shit' face and pointed to his ass. This brightened the mood a little and Trish grinned widely.
"Don't tempt me." She winked and walked her way over to the front door. "Anyway, I've got some jobs on the side to do so I'll see you later." Dante looked up, turning serious.
"You never told me that you had things planned today!" He pointed at her angrily. "What have you got going on?" He asked with suspicion.
"That..." She opened the door to the half ruined city streets outside. "...is for me to know, and for you to find out. See ya'!" She twirled and shut the door behind her, leaving Dante in a silent room all to himself.
"Humph." He sat hunched in his chair for a moment, tapping the desk impatiently and hoping for something interesting to happen. Like for a demon-cult to come crashing through the front of his house/store with a load of hostages for him to heroically save. Or maybe for his brother Virgil to appear before him in a flash of light with some henchmen and start a battle that he would so easily win. But no. Nothing happened.
He tried to have a nap but the busy day-time city sounds kept him from even slightly dozing off. Today was going to be another boring day where nothing would happen and he would just sit and watch TV or listen to music or get drunk at a local bar. He turned his attention to the playboy calender hung on the wall next to him. Today was Tuesday, the second worst day of the week, next to Monday of course. Most of the previous days had boxes filled with crude crayon drawings of stickmen killing other stickmen, dicks, and dick jokes. Some even had useful one-liners that he used after defeating a foe in combat. So far, Dante had only ever lost a fight once. And that was to his brother when he was hyped up on demon power that Yamato had provided, and was able to literally block bullets by spinning Yamato ultra fast.
"I wonder were he is now?" The last time he had seen Virgil in human form was after he escaped the demon world and left him down there with Mundus, and the rest of the demon army.
This was a conflicted topic within Dante's head. Virgil had attempted to open a gate to the demon world and obtain the power of their father, Sparda. Dante had stopped his brother from possibly destroying a large portion of the world, but he later found out that he had been corrupted by the prince of darkness, Mundus, and turned into the demon called 'Nelo Angelo'. Had he known that Nelo Angelo was Virgil then maybe he could have saved him before he was killed. But the truth was that at the end of the day, Virgil was his brother. Dante was sad to see him go, even if he was evil.
While he sat his second co-worker, Mary, or 'Lady' as she liked to be known as now, walked in through the door and broke his chain of thought. Her footsteps where heavy due to the over-sized rocket launcher slung on her back. She stood in the doorway for a moment, watching his thousand-yard-stare break when she entered the room.
"Thinking, are we?" She questioned when she saw him staring blankly into space, fiddling with the necklace around his neck.
"Why are the women in my life always judging me?" He asked sarcastically. "First Trish has a go at me for wasting money and now you're trying to get into my head!" Mary flipped him off, making him laugh.
"It's not my fault you have an ego the size of Trish's tits. Have you even seen those things? They're not natural!" She walked over and leaned on the desk with a smile on her face.
"You've seen Trish's tits? I'm beginning to feel jealous." Mary paused for a second after Dante finished his joke and then face-palmed at her mistake.
"It's literally impossible to banter with you."
"Yeah? Well you're a pain in my ass."
"Then at least we're even." She gave him a gentle shove with one hand and walked upstairs. Once again Dante was left to his own devices, not that he had any, and to somehow think of a way to pass the time.
His sword, 'Rebellion', hung on it's rack next to the calender along with his two pistols, 'Ebony' and 'Ivory'. He sat and stared at them for a while, and before long he came to the logical conclusion that if trouble wouldn't come to him then he would go out and find it himself.
"NNRAAR!" Nero screamed, lunging forward at the approaching monster and swinging his new sword diagonally and slicing it clean in half from shoulder to waist. It exploded with a powerful energy and he turned to face a new group of 3 enemies. He readied his stance and inverted the swords position in his hand like he would hold a dagger.
As they got within striking range, he coiled back his arm like he was performing a backhand slash, but instead spun round and thrust forward. The monster, expecting a slash, was taken by surprise when the 4 foot blade shanked it in the stomach and tore upwards. Nero then flipped hand again to the traditional forehand and proceeded to quickly cut down the demon to his right.
The final construct swung and hacked viciously and Nero jumped backwards to avoid the flailing blades embedded in it's fleshy arms. The monster raised both arms and jumped forward to try and decapitate him there and then, but was tricked when Nero jumped to meet it, cutting low. The low swing sliced through the flesh like butter and completely separated it's legs from the torso. He stood there catching his breath for a second while the silence sunk back in after the sounds of death screams were drained away from the air. Holding his stance, he knew that they would not give up that easily.
The ground rumbled like a small earthquake and he looked around cautiously, waiting for something to come his way. The tense shaking continued to tremble for a moment until it suddenly stopped without warning. Nero smiled and started walking away from the arena where the dissolving bodies of demonic constructs lay lifelessly.
And although the ground practically exploded behind him, he was ready for it. The concrete was ruptured easily by the behemoth that rose up from the fracture, throwing Nero into the air. He used the momentum to wall run along the side of a building, leaping of it's surface towards the giant clawed legs of the insectoid beast. Brushing by them and missing by inches, he jammed the sword into it's hard armoured skin and used it as leverage to swing up and onto the creatures back.
The giant mantis-like demon realised that it had the dis-advantage so early in the fight, and used its powerful legs to jump unbelievably high into the air and began to twist and writhe in an attempt to shake Nero from it's carapace. Nero however, held firm. He kept his balance and when the demons front legs were raised above it's head, he ran up the leg that he swung off and jumped for the katana still wedged into it's skin. Grabbing the handle, he pulled with all his might and ripped it out of it's position and back-flipping into the air where he landed on the insects long head, stabbing the sword into it's snout to prevent himself from falling off.
The demon landed from it's great jump and kicked up a huge amount of dust in the process. It shook it's head violently to remove the tiny warrior, but when the dust cleared he was nowhere to be seen. It looked around frantically for the missing attacker.
"WHERE ARE YOU?" It's raspy voice boomed throughout the air. "SHOW YOURSELF!" As it searched around, confused as to why the half-demon human had disappeared all of a sudden. Nero was hanging onto a large bony spine sticking out from the back of the beast's head.
"Hey!" He shouted, getting it's attention immediately. The effect was perfect. Hearing the voice come from directly behind it's head, it looked up and strained it's eyes back, trying it's damned hardest to spot him in it's blind spot. He set off again, this time using his old sword making his plan easier. Sprinting up it's head, using spines as ledges to jump up. Eventually he reached the bridge of it's 'nose' where it had to go cross eyed to see him, and stood there, sword in hand.
He smiled and leaped into the air, diving back down on it's left eye using the sword as a spear to pierce the eyeball. Just before they collided he pulled down the lever on the swords handle and twisted it with a *CLICK*. It let out a harsh mechanical growl as flaming liquid was sprayed onto the blade and it lit up orange with an intense heat, sparking through the air and into the monster's eye. Nero sliced through the soft tissue, through the back of the eye-socket and finally, the brain. Carving a hole straight through the head, he eventually burst from the back of it's skull. Burning brain tissue and shards of bone were sent flying in a red gory cone that sprayed blood everywhere.
He found himself free falling 50 feet through the air and shouldered the over-sized sword in his back to allow him more space to prepare for a landing. He might be half demon but he wasn't invincible by any means. A long fall would still do damage if he didn't land right.
Finally hitting the ground with a loud *SLAM*, dust was thrown out in a big ring around him. His black and maroon coat flicked around with the resulting air disturbance and his arms were outstretched sideways to avoid crushing them in his crouched position. A second after landing all of the gore from the demon's head landed around him, creating a patch of red that circled him menacingly. Nero slowly rose to a stand and the quiet was broken by the insect beast collapsing onto the ground and crashing through several buildings behind him causing another dust cloud to be thrown into the air.
Nero stood in the cloud and waited for it to clear. When it did, his right arm, his demon arm, hummed with energy from the slaughter. A small crowd of on-lookers rose from their hiding places and gawped in amazement at the spectacle before them. However, all that dust caught up on Nero and he let out an embarrassing sneeze, breaking his bad-ass posture.
There was silence for a moment. The growing crowd not sure what to say, and Nero waiting for something to happen. After what felt like an eternity, a woman dressed lightly in black came running in through a gap in the crowd.
"Outta' the way!" She sprinted through the parting mass and gasped at the scene before her. Nero stood there smiling while the dead giant lay behind him. After that she changed from shocked the bemused.
"Nero." She deadpanned him. "That was going to be MY kill. MY job that I took up from one of MY clients!" She pointed at him in irritation.
"Yeah? Well I'm sorry I took your part." He walked toward her and stopped when face to face. "It's good to see you Trish." He held out his hand and Trish shook it half heartedly.
"Good to see you too, lover boy. Speaking of, where's..."
"Kyrie."
"Yes, Kyrie."
"She's back at our flat. She's probably worried sick, I should get going." He began to walk away but before he could go very far, gunfire was heard and Nero flinched at the bullet wizzing past his ear.
"Not so fast, Kid." The voice of Dante said mockingly. He stopped and turned around to face him.
"What's the matter?" He asked.
"I need to speak with both of you." He pointed the heavily modified black pistol to them both in succession. Nero shrugged and walked to Trish's side.
"Oh, here we go again." Trish face palmed and sighed.
"Right!" Dante holstered the pistol and rubbed his hands together while he approached them. "First, Trish, you knew there was going to be a HUGE demon attacking here and you kept it a secret because you didn't want someone to steal your job?"
"Yeah..." She shrugged innocently. "What's wrong with that?"
"What's wrong with that is that I was bored as fuck! You knew that I was looking for something to do and you didn't tell me just to annoy me!" Despite his apparent rage, Dante didn't seem to be being too aggressive. In fact, it sounded more like sarcastic anger than anything. "And Nero, I know you're knew to the demon hunting thing, but if there's one thing that really pisses of a bounty hunter, it's stealing their jobs... However!" He raised his finger with a smug smile. "Considering Trish was being such a bitch to me earlier, I think I'll let you off." Trish flipped him off and the guys started to laugh.
The sound of a motor-bike engine faded in as a large armoured bike drove through the gap in the crowd that Trish had made. It skidded to a halt beside them. The young woman in white stepped off the bike, her Sub Machine Guns and Rocket launcher rattling as she walked to the group.
"Phew..." She whistled in awe at the dead behemoth behind them. "Did you guys do that?" Dante and Trish pointed at Nero who was still smiling after his laughing fit. She made a 'Not bad' face and nodded in respect. "Nice kill."
"Meh, no problem. Anyway I should be getting off now, Kyrie will be waiting for me."
"She's waiting for you to get off, is she?" Dante questioned him with a shit eating grin and Nero threw a couple of coins at him.
"Shut your stupid smart ass mouth and use these to fill it with those pizza's you like so much." Nero gave his argument response.
"Wait. How do you know I like pizza?"
"You wouldn't shut up about it at the bar a few days ago."
"I don't remember going to the bar a few days ago!"
"You got completely smashed, so I'm not surprised you don't remember anything."
"Hey! I don't binge drink you lying bastard!"
"Oh really? Because I specifically remember you getting so pissed that you tried to kiss Trish in public. Needless to say, she wasn't very happy."
"Ahh, so that's where those bruises came from." Dante exclaimed with a sudden realisation, rubbing a small mark on his forehead.
"Right, can we all get going now?" Trish asked. However she didn't get time for a response as the ground began to shake again. All four of them widened their stances in preparation for a stand off. The shaking carried on for a second and the group turned to the big hole where the giant mantis had come from before. Weapons drawn, all took up defensive positions. Except Dante. Who just stood there tapping his foot on the floor impatiently.
"Why can't it just come up and fight straight away? I've been itchin' for a fight lately!"
"SHUT UP!" The other three shouted at him angrily. Dante huffed and drew his sword, waiting casually for the next attacker. The earthquake carried on until a huge object rose from the hole in the ground. The group reeled back in confusion as the only thing that happened was a big stone monument erecting itself in the middle of the street. Silence overcame them and Dante sighed.
"Well that was anti-climactic." He said with no expression, obviously a bit disappointed. They were about to sheath their weapons when the monument made a metallic *PING* that sounded out over the city, echoing for miles around. Then the stone on the tower collapsed, revealing a demon portal that had been activated with the sound. The portal sucked in the huge amounts of stone and gaining power, began tugging the demon hunters as-well.
"SHIIIIIIIIIIIII" Nero screamed as he and the demon hunters were pulled off of their own feet and sucked into the portal's opening. Once they and their screams disappeared, the vortex closed and the portal shut down, locking them on the other side.